"In My Time"

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Via Pitchfork

Kurt Vile's brand of scratchy, alternate-universe classic rock songwriting has its downcast moments, but none as weary as those captured on the Philadelphia singer/songwriter's most recent EP, Square Shells. There, Vile sounded irrepressibly lonely and bummed, singing about searching for comfort songs like the clicking seven-minute standout "Invisibility: Nonexistent". It was relatively dark stuff, so when Vile's forthcoming single, "In My Time", was unveiled, it was almost a relief to see him with a sly grin on the cover, holed up in a studio that didn't look like a warehouse, abandoned mausoleum, or any of the million other grim places that Square Shells could've been set in. The song's chiming acoustic melody that opens the song further sets this solid-ground attitude, as Vile ruminates on the past like the youngest old soul there is: "In my time I was whacked and wild/ I was just being myself, man." He eventually finds that contentedness he was previously looking for in "Invisibility: Nonexistent", with a slightly dark twist: "I know when I get older/ I'm dyin'/ I've got everything I need/ That's fine." Or: the end's not near, but when it is, I'll be quite all right, thanks.

[from the "In My Time" single; out now digitally and 11/09/10 on 7" via Matador]